A local Christmas, overseas

Blue Star moms ready packages from home.

THE EVENING SUN TYLER SIZEMORE
From left: Dee Zygmunta, of Hanover; Josephine Vechini, of New Oxford; Denise Yingling, of Thomasville; and Vanessa Baker, of New Oxford box up homemade cookies at the Blue Star Mothers service day for troops at the Hanover VFW Post 2506 on Dec. 1. Blue Star Mothers and friends filled boxes with food, clothes, games and cards. Donations were collected from the VFW, Nell s Shurfine, Paradise Lutheran Church, the American Legion and Welcome Wagon York, along with several personal donations.

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Stella Mefford, a Marine grandmother from Littlestown signs a card for a troop at the Blue Star Mothers service day for troops at Hanover VFW Post 2506 on Dec. 1.

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The South Central Pennsylvania Blue Star Mothers continued their annual holiday tradition for service members across the country and overseas by meeting in Hanover to pack 57 boxes filled with food, games and cards to send to the troops for Christmas.

The boxes, along with 13 packages of apples, will go to deployed troops, stateside service members and Wounded Warriors. The Blue Star Mothers and several volunteers packed the boxes Saturday at the Hanover VFW.

The group started sending homemade cookies to troops about seven years ago, South Central Pennsylvania Blue Star Mothers President Lori Menges said. Each year, the event grew as the group began adding extra food, clothes and other gifts to the packages.

Rose Rollins, a Blue Star mom from Hanover with a daughter in the Marines, packs a box for a troop at the Blue Star Mothers service day for troops at the Hanover VFW Post 2506 on Dec. 1.

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Many of the country's service members are stateside, waiting to be deployed and unable to go home for Christmas, she added. Those service members receive a $25 Walmart gift card and homemade cookies, for a little taste of home.

Blue Star Mothers also holds clothing drives for the Wounded Warriors in Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany. Menges said these service members are given clothes, such as pajamas and sweatpants, to wear around the hospital as they heal.

"We want to show that we think about them, too," Menges said of the stateside troops and Wounded Warriors.

Although money is tight, Menges said locals were generous with donations this year, especially at the Blue Star Mothers donation drive outside Nell's Shurfine Supermarket on Baltimore Street.

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The women were asking customers to donate Christmas-themed treats, from candy canes to cookies. Some people donated 10 boxes of cookies, Menges said.

And the women also received donations of dog treats, for two dogs deployed in Afghanistan.

For more information about the Blue Star Mothers, email scpabluestarmoms@aol.com or go to the group's Facebook page listed under Blue Star Mothers of South Central Pa.